humanism vs formalism?
Right Across Left Hook Combo
knowledge of criticism beyond those of 'popularizers' I've always
wondered what these terms meant.
What follows is my impression of what they mean.
Humanism--at least as understood in the world of cinematic
discourse--is where the movie is centered around the minuteia, the
constantly changing chaos of human life. Man is at the center of the
story and the movie sticks close to his mental state and physical
rhythm. The meaning of the movie derives from what the character
thinks and how he acts. There's a sense of free will, a sense that we
control our own destiny. Or, that even if we don't control our destiny
we are unique and alone in the universe. We do it our way or even when
we don't, we fail as individuals. The focus is on subjectivity of the
character.
Formalism, on the other hand, isn't interested in man as individual
but as a player--usually unwitting--in some grand scheme. He may or
may not be aware of the structures that govern the world or his
psychology but he's trapped within patterns, in a maze that is beyond
his senses and intellect.
Granted, the most satisfying movies tend to have both elements. Think
of Shining where Nicholson is irrepressibly Nicholson but also a pawn
in some inscrutable game.
Same could be said for Andrei Rublev, where the medieval painter has
the power to mature and change but ultimately is a link in a chain
that goes backward and forward into the mists of time.
Still, both tend toward formalism.
I think Scorsese of Mean Streets is the ultimate humanist. The movie
jerks about with the rhythm of its characters. The characters are the
movie; they dictate the its style, pace, mood.
Humanists favor the trees whereas formalists favor the forest.
Humanists tend toward emotionalism whereas the latter tend to toward
intellectualism.
This dichotomy probably applies to pure entertainment as well, with
Hitchcock falling in the formalist camp whereas Elia Kazan would fall
into the humanist camp.
Objectively, I probably admire formalists like Mizoguchi, Kubrick,
Tarkovsky more but I prefer the humanism of early Kurosawa and such
films as Last Detail and Prince of the City, films of Tavernier to
stuff by Rivette.
madkevin
"Right Across Left Hook Combo" <nicoci...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:abce8ddf.0311...@posting.google.com...
Funny, I thought your name was Elena. How much longer are we planning on
sticking around this time, Tony?
Kevin "Out Of Time" Cogliano
Chemqueries
>Funny, I thought your name was Elena. How much longer are we planning on
>sticking around this time, Tony?
Who the heck is this "Tony?" Can someone fill me in on what's going on here? A
few weeks ago, another rampf poster (the chemist from Israel) accused me of
being Tony. Please enlighten me on this inside joke.
Jim
> I sometimes encounter these terms in essays on film. Having little
> knowledge of criticism beyond those of 'popularizers' I've always
> wondered what these terms meant.
>
> What follows is my impression of what they mean.
>
> Humanism--at least as understood in the world of cinematic
> discourse--is where the movie is centered around the minuteia, the
> constantly changing chaos of human life. Man is at the center of the
> story and the movie sticks close to his mental state and physical
> rhythm. The meaning of the movie derives from what the character
> thinks and how he acts. There's a sense of free will, a sense that we
> control our own destiny. Or, that even if we don't control our destiny
> we are unique and alone in the universe. We do it our way or even when
> we don't, we fail as individuals. The focus is on subjectivity of the
> character.
>
> Formalism, on the other hand, isn't interested in man as individual
> but as a player--usually unwitting--in some grand scheme. He may or
> may not be aware of the structures that govern the world or his
> psychology but he's trapped within patterns, in a maze that is beyond
> his senses and intellect.
The idea that there is some split between humanism and formalism goes back
to the early Soviet era when the party wanted to destroy formalism (which
was born in Russia) and promote Soviet realism. Supposedly, Soviet realism
was doing more to promote human values. This is a false dichotomy and a
stupid idea. A person who's interested in style never cares about people?
If you still buy the idea, try reading a few Soviet realist novels and you
might start to think that style and formalism are good things. As a student
of Russian culture, I had to read it all. Give me an artist who's
interested in style any day.
Elena Nakashima
I don't think humanism has to necessarily be realism or vice versa.
Soviet Realism was what one might call party-line formalism(as opposed
to experimental formalism). Stalinist cinema buried the individual,
the human being in favor of the masses, in favor of the socialist
icon, the hero worker, the patriotic soldier. Such films failed both
in terms of humanism and formalism(in the intellectual sense).
Realism tend toward humanism but even here we must keep in mind that
social realism(as opposed to 'socialist' realism) imparts a different
sense of reality than, say, realist representation of nature or any
other non-human world. Realism about human behavior has to be true to
the verve and rhythm of human awareness which is quite different than
that of plants, animals, wind, and rain. Am I confusing realism with
naturalism? Is realism necessarily linked to human affairs?
madkevin
"Chemqueries" <chemq...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20031115160956...@mb-m05.aol.com...
Do a google search on "Anthony Gaza", and you'll come up with much much more
than you ever wanted to know.
Kevin "The Abyss" Cogliano
monsieurblob
> I sometimes encounter these terms in essays on film. Having little
> knowledge of criticism beyond those of 'popularizers' I've always
> wondered what these terms meant.
>
> What follows is my impression of what they mean.
>
> Humanism--at least as understood in the world of cinematic
> discourse--is where the movie is centered around the minuteia, the
> constantly changing chaos of human life. Man is at the center of the
> story and the movie sticks close to his mental state and physical
> rhythm. The meaning of the movie derives from what the character
> thinks and how he acts. There's a sense of free will, a sense that we
> control our own destiny. Or, that even if we don't control our destiny
> we are unique and alone in the universe. We do it our way or even when
> we don't, we fail as individuals. The focus is on subjectivity of the
> character.
humanism is a term that never shouldve been used in cinematic
discourse. its bout walter benjamin and peeps with the neo peeps
quoting walter, trying to elevate film, in reality film writing, to a
level that it either never deserved or even lacked any interest at
all. for instance, medicine is a humanism, film has always been
ideology, manipulation, identification, ejaculation and, for the
morons, suture, but would be an insult to medicine to call it a
humanism. secondly, it just isnt interesting to call any cinema a
humanism, coz that terrain already and merely belongs to other
football pitches, other 'sciences', like ethics or religion.
pointless, like the study of stereotype in a film classroom (in this
case really left wing masked deconstruction or mutation of eurocentric
multiculturalist bullocks). mucho mucho better is phenomenological
(limited, course, belongs to philosophy), close textual analysis or
analysis of realist patterns in film drawing from 19th century
criticism of the novel like the guy does in disclosure of the
everyday, lovely piece on ozu btw. if anything, course, because with
film the real stuff lies in experience and incredibly so, maybe not in
the aesthetics itself, let alone in (T)theory with shaky grounds
embedded on criticism
>
> Formalism, on the other hand, isn't interested in man as individual
> but as a player--usually unwitting--in some grand scheme. He may or
> may not be aware of the structures that govern the world or his
> psychology but he's trapped within patterns, in a maze that is beyond
> his senses and intellect.
formalism, and its neos (mutants, time and place lagging), excercises
in ejaculatory narcissism and nostalghia, is (and perhaps was) based
on a masochistic conception of the art form by which any image if
original and unusual, and so unpopular and (aha! at it again)
anti-capitalistic anti-system. a haven (haren?) for left wing blabbers
masked like in a shakespeare much ado bout nutin. i detest formalism
mainly because of its persistent contempt for individual man (lol?),
but no really, experience, phenomenology and
film-(im?)moral-relativism. rosenbaum chief exponent (twat), followed
by others, suspicious intentions, floating weeds of semen. and also
ignores influence of ee cummings in cinema, (or at least utopian).
with all this said, i still love stuff like uzak.